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The end of the 40-year marriage of Al and Tipper Gore came as a shock to members of their political circle.
AP Photo

“If you rank the marriages among politicians, this would have been viewed as one of the more stable and loving ones,” said John Geer, a professor at Vanderbilt University in Nashville who knows the Gores. “When I ever saw them together, it was clear they liked each other.”

Tipper played a humanizing role in shaping Gore’s message as well, Shrum recalled in his memoir. When other advisers couldn’t persuade the vice president to strike from his acceptance speech a long discussion of physicist Stephen Hawking, they turned to Tipper.

“Al, take it out,” she told him, and he did.

Gore, on the campaign trail, was “enormously devoted to his family,” recalled another former aide, Matt Bennett, who also said he was “completely stunned” by the news of the separation.

Al and Tipper Gore had a much more diffident attitude than the Clintons toward the public stage — an ambivalence that doubtless imposed psychic costs on them and their relationship. Public performance was an emotional lift for him. It sometimes seemed easier for her when she was in a good mood, but aides and journalists said she could be morose and foul-tempered when she was not.

“There used to be a kind of emotional weather report when we got on the plane in the morning,” recalled an aide. “When he was up and on and plugged in and engaged he was a good politician, and her mood had a big impact on that.”

The Gores were together for the former vice president's careful re-emergence and for the 2004 interview with The New Yorker's David Remnick that brought Al Gore back to the public stage.

Remnick described driving with the couple and portrayed them as inseparable.

"Tipper’s directions were flawless and Gore followed them — a rarity in the history of the marital institution," he wrote.

More recently, they have spent more time apart than together, friends said, as the former vice president has made Silicon Valley the center of his business and political life, a base for investing and fundraising for his fight against climate change.

In their political mode the Gores stood for everything the Clintons were not — symbolically and actually. Tipper Gore was particularly bitter over Bill Clinton’s infidelity and subsequent lies and was absent from events with him after the scandal, an observer recalled.

Tuesday’s news was absorbed largely in that context.

”Can you believe that Bill and Hillary are still married and Al and Tipper are getting divorced?” a Democratic consultant marveled.

Ultimately, though, the Gore separation will serve largely just as a reminder of how unknowable others’ relationships are. Most Gore friends declined to be quoted discussing a couple who had managed to keep their personal life largely out of the public eye.

"We ask for respect for our privacy and that of our family, and we do not intend to comment further,” the Gores wrote in their e-mail to friends.

Readers' Comments (99)

Jeesh . . . . . the Gore family publicist couldn't have written it any better. And that gushing bit about making Barbara Bush the last first lady to define herself as a traditional homemaker? You might add, one of the more highly-regarded first ladies in recent times.

How, by the way, should first lady Michelle define herself . . . . as a gardener? A nutritional advisor? Now there's a power position.

I am an 80 year-old Yellow Dog Democratic woman and have been so all of my life. I support Gore's war on global warming.

That being said,

1. I am sure he was never called Al by his parents. He was the only son of aristocrats. Als drive trucks or are Italian politicians from New Jersey or Irish Catholics from New York who ran for president in the 1920s and who lost. Ok, ok, I know we all know lots of Als who are none of the above but you get my drift.

2. He wussed out when he graciously accepted the illegal election. He should have gone kicking and screaming.

3. His scripted public kiss of Tipper was jerky and as awkward as a teen-ager's first try.

4. He has to be the most boring public figure since Calvin Coolidge.

I never understood why they stayed together as long as they did. But then, I have yet to understand the human heart.

My guess is that Tipper gets the Nashville estate, while Al moves into the beach front Malibu digs? Gore is a lot more likely to attract investors to his environmental Ponzi schemes on the left coast, rather than Tennessee. Much has been reported on Gore's loss to Dubya in the Florida 2000 Presidential Election, but little is said about him losing in his home state of Tennessee that same year. Tipper has come to the same conclusion in regards to Gore as had Tennessee. Al “has been weighed, he has been measured, and has been found wanting”.

I have been there. Separated after 38 years. I still love my wife more than anyone else past, present or future, but we did grow apart. We are better friends now than at any time in the last 20 years of our marriage. It works for us. I hope it works for the Gores.

Tipper is a very strong woman, she won't put up with Al's shennanigans; I think the guy is fooling around. Of course Tipper will not go down to his level. I've met Al Gore in the 90's when he was running for VP with Bubba Clinton. I remember when I shook his hand, he was like a cartoon character, not interested of meeting people while Bubba is the exact, he was approachable. Gore is a different kind of animal. Tipper is a warm-hearted woman, easy to talk to. It was RSVP dinner, I had to bring my checkbook. I voted for Bubba twice and Gore in 2000, but I knew he would lose the election, there's an air of coldness about Al Gore. He gives an impression he's above you. Hillary has the same trait as Al Gore, she changed as years goes by, she can thank Bubba for that. Hillary and Al Gore can turn off people real fast - they both have an ELITE MENTALITY.

Tipper finally got sick of this boorish baffoon. He has been a joke for years - a phoney money grubbing jerk! To think he could have been President. Almost as scary as the idiot street pimp we have in the White House now. If we don't get this bunch out of office, this country is doomed. Freedom of speech is in danger. The economy is already beyond repair. We won't have an ally left. We're on our way to a third world country with these leftist commie loving libs.

Well done, Ben Smith. No wonder Politico (again) got this first. This is touching without being too misty-eyed and insightful without slipping into "what does this mean for the rest of us" babble. Just one quibble with Geer's quote: "It was clear they liked each other."

Let's hope as this unfolds that that statement proves to be wrong and that it's clear they STILL like each other.

Well done, Ben Smith. No wonder Politico (again) got this first. This is touching without being too misty-eyed and insightful without slipping into "what does this mean for the rest of us" babble. Just one quibble with Geer's quote: "It was clear they liked each other."

Let's hope as this unfolds that that statement proves to be wrong and that it's clear they STILL like each other.

"mutual and mutually supportive decision that we have made together following a process of long and careful consideration.”

What bullcrap. He can't speak honestly to save his life. I hope she gets a bunch of the ill-gotten gain derived through terrorizing the gullible with phony threats based on junk science, and outright lies.

A model marriage? Don't make me throw up. Al Gore has always acted like a sissy mama's boy who had a pants full. Tipper Gore has more to offer in her little finger than Al ever dreamed of in his whole life. He's a phony!

A model marriage? Don't make me throw up. Al Gore has always acted like a sissy mama's boy who had a pants full. Tipper Gore has more to offer in her little finger than Al ever dreamed of in his whole life. He's a phony!